Fire lookout · Bonner County, Idaho
Butler (Blacktail)
Also known as Butler (Blacktail) Mountain Lookout, Butler (Bimetallic Ridge)
Blacktail Mountain lookout: camp 1926, 40-foot L-4 tower 1936, destroyed 1947; a 1931 lightning death is recorded. Footings and ruins remain.
- Gone
- Access unknown
- Verified
Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Destroyed in 1947; the Idaho Fire Lookouts page reports cement footings and cabin-like ruins still on the peaks.
Visit & stay
Gone: site only. The lookout no longer stands, so there is nothing to climb or rent.
Access
Access unknown
We do not know the access rules. Check with the land manager before you go.
- Road to the top?
- No, you have to hike
Facts
- Status
- Type
- Cab on a tower40-foot L-4 cab towerThe design: L-4
- Built of
- Not recorded
- Built
- 1936
- Height
- Unknown
- Elevation
- Unknown
- Agency
- Coeur d'Alene National Forest
- Land
- Federal land
- Location
- Bonner County, Idaho
- Coordinates
- 48.13047, −116.52547 sources disagree
- Registers
- Not on a lookout register
- This entry
- VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 10 Oct 2026.
- Firefinder id
us-id-butler-blacktail
View from the cab
What the lookout saw from its cab: every ridge out to about 93 miles, the named peaks in sight, and other fire lookouts within view, worked out from terrain data in your browser.
This lookout is gone. The view is reconstructed from its recorded site and a typical height for a lookout like it.
Downloads about 4.3 MB of terrain data the first time.
Or see what it could see on the map: the ground in its line of sight.
History
Then and now
- 1926 EventCamp established at the siteSources: firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com
- 1927 Event10x10 cabin built a half mile eastSources: firelookout.com, idaholookouts.weebly.com
- 1931 EventLookout named Butler killed by lightning in the lookout house; reports differ on name, age and date (June 17 per one source, a Sunday per newspaper reprints)Sources: idahofirelookouts.com, idaholookouts.weebly.com
- 1936 Built40-foot L-4 tower atop Blacktail Mountain, one mile south of Butler MountainSources: firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com
- 1947 DestroyedSources: firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com
- TodayGoneThe lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left.
Old maps of this spot
USGS topographic maps from the years a lookout stood may show it, often as a small symbol labelled “Lookout”. See the old topo maps around it on the Firefinder map, or find every scanned sheet of this spot on USGS TopoView (opens another site) (click the spot there to list them, with dates and downloads).
Story
Researched 10 Oct 2026, fact-checked.
A lookout on Blacktail Mountain, 10 miles south of Sandpoint in Bonner County, Idaho, began as a camp in 1926.1,2 A mine was located on the site years before the tower.2 A 10-by-10-foot cabin went up a half mile east in 1927.1
In 1936 a 40-foot L-4 tower was built atop Blacktail Mountain, one mile south of Butler Mountain, in the Coeur d'Alene National Forest.1,2
In June 1931 a young lookout named Butler was killed by lightning inside the lookout house during a thunderstorm.2,3 Reports give his first name as James, Ben or Glen, and his age as either about 19 or 23.3 One report describes a Sunday evening strike, while the Idaho Fire Lookouts page dates it to June 17, 1931.2,3
The tower was destroyed in 1947.1,2
Today the Idaho Fire Lookouts page describes cement footings on Butler Mountain, with grounding cables and wire, and ruins on Blacktail Mountain that look like a cabin.2 The page questions whether the Butler Mountain footings belong to the 1936 tower.2 It calls the site hike-in.2 No source I found says whether the land is open to visitors.
- Butler (Blacktail) (Bimetallic) Fire Lookout Tower, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/id/butlerbb.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
- Butler (Blacktail) Mountain Lookout, Idaho Fire Lookouts, https://www.idahofirelookouts.com/cda-region/butler-mountain-lookout/ (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
- Butler - FOREST LOOKOUTS, Idaho Forest Lookouts, https://idaholookouts.weebly.com/butler.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
Photos
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Where sources disagree
We show disagreements between sources instead of quietly picking one. If you know which is right, please tell us.
Sources disagree on the location by 1.4 km (0.9 mi).
- Idaho Fire Lookouts (idahofirelookouts.com): 48.13047, −116.52547
- FFLA: 48.11893, −116.51886
- firelookout.com -- Rex Kamstra's Forest Fire Lookout Page: 48.11893, −116.51886
The map uses the position from Idaho Fire Lookouts (idahofirelookouts.com).
Sources
- Forest Fire Lookout Association (FFLA) - US lookout lists (opens another site) Gave us: name, county, type, status, links Forest Fire Lookout Association (firelookout.org) · No licence stated; facts extracted only, no prose copied. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
- firelookout.com -- Rex Kamstra's Forest Fire Lookout Page (opens another site) Gave us: links firelookout.com · No licence stated on the site; facts only (coordinates, elevation, built/destroyed years, design, agency). Photos mirrored with the site's stated credit. · retrieved 4 Oct 2026
- Idaho Fire Lookouts (idahofirelookouts.com) (opens another site) Gave us: location, dates, photos, links idahofirelookouts.com · No licence stated; facts only (coordinates, status/built/destroyed year parsed from each entry's short excerpt). Thumbnail photos mirrored with credit per the project's photo policy. · retrieved 4 Oct 2026
- FOREST LOOKOUTS -- western US (Ron Kemnow's weebly sites) (opens another site) Gave us: agency, ownership, links Ron Kemnow's Forest Lookouts sites (westlookouts, californialookouts, idaholookouts, montanalookouts, oregonlookouts and washingtonlookouts .weebly.com) · No licence stated; facts only (county, land manager, status word, coordinates where the page's own map widget gives them, township-range-section, height and design hints, links). The site's own newspaper quotes, citations and narrative are not reproduced. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
- Firefinder research Gave us: summary, design, status, agency, staffing, visiting details, dates, links, fact-check Firefinder research (sources cited in the story footnotes) · Our own research notes; each fact cites its source in the lookout's story
More about this lookout elsewhere
- FFLA Idaho lookout list (firelookout.org) (opens another site)
- Butler (Blacktail) on firelookout.com (Rex Kamstra) (opens another site)
- Butler (Blacktail) Mountain Lookout on idahofirelookouts.com (opens another site)
- Butler (Bimetallic Ridge) on Forest Lookouts, western US (Ron Kemnow) (opens another site)
Firefinder takes facts (places, dates, numbers) from these sources and writes its own words. See all sources and licences.